MEEKS: No more recess

It was startling to observe the reactions generated by the president's tears. After hearing more about his tears than the executive order that was being signed to extend background checks and to institute a few other constraints to make it a little harder to buy a gun, I decided to find a videotape of the event to view. Since there was such chatter about the incident, I had expected to see an out-of-control, practically hysterical person.

Instead, what I saw was the president of the United States reflecting upon the families of the little children at Sandy Hook Elementary and all of the other families with whom he has grieved over the loss their children. A loss caused by the actions of some mentally deranged persons who chose to address their mental anguish by taking the lives of others.

The truth is that this is a matter about which one should cry. All of us should be crying. There are too many senseless gun deaths in America. Little children going to school, on what should have been a normal Friday, have a right to expect to return home to their parents at the end of the day. They should not lose their lives at the hands of a young man with many layers of problems including being indulged by his mother. After all, she was the person who bought the guns that eventually caused the carnage.

The president wept. And many in America thought that it was political theater. How sad. I listened to a round table discussion about the tears of the president and heard one man sharing his disgust because the leader of the so called "free world" should not cry. What a notion. Anyone who is leading any country these days needs to be willing and able to cry. Most leaders should be crying because their people are suffering. Americans are suffering from many ills, but one of the worst is gun violence.

And along with that, we don't seem to have the will to turn off our steady flow of violence, thus making it impossible to address the issue of guns. There is a significant number of people who constantly argue that our problem is not guns because it is the people. Well, they might be correct. But if those people had no guns, their method of killing would have to be far more labor-intensive, and that fact alone might save a few lives. Guns do in fact kill people, though many gun owners are responsible and use their guns appropriately for hunting or recreational shooting.

The president demonstrated that he has the capacity to care enough to allow himself to feel the pain of the senseless loss of life from guns in our country. Even the power of the presidency seems unable to curb this deadly pattern. How can those who continue to fight to allow anyone who wishes to have any and all kinds of guns look in the mirror? The availability of guns and the reckless use of them should make us all cry. Those who were sitting up on their self-made pedestal throwing rocks at the Obama tears should stop and take a minute to reflect upon why his tears bother them so much.

If more elected officials could remember to cry a little along the way it might help to soften the hearts of those who seem to think that everyone's personal liberty is tied up in the ownership of a gun.

I am thankful for a president who has not allowed all of the tears to be squeezed out of his heart by the power of the office and the challenges of the presidency. I am thankful that he decided that recess is over and that it is time to get to work.

This column by Catherine Meeks, Ph.D., appears twice monthly. Email her at kayma53@att.net.

This story was originally published January 12, 2016 at 8:19 PM with the headline "MEEKS: No more recess ."